G.R. No. L-27036 November 26, 1970
Natividad Cabacug, plaintiff-appellee, vs. Placido Lao and Superla Revelo, defendants-appellants.

FACTS

The plaintiff, Natividad Cabacug, was born a Filipino citizen. She married Te Ben Ting, a Chinese citizen, on January 26, 1944. Te Ben Ting died on October 19, 1946. On March 16, 1957, Original Certificate of Title No. P-1332, Free Patent No. V-67-921, covering two parcels of land in Tudela, Misamis Occidental, was issued to the plaintiff. On September 13, 1962, the plaintiff sold these two parcels of land to the defendants, Placido Lao and Superla Revelo, for P13,500.00, and Transfer Certificate of Title No. T-436 was issued in the defendants’ name. The plaintiff later offered to repurchase the land on several occasions, but the defendants refused. On August 11, 1965, the plaintiff deposited P13,165.00 as repurchase money with the Clerk of Court and filed a complaint for repurchase with damages on September 22, 1965. At the time of the stipulation of facts, the plaintiff had not filed an affidavit of repatriation, although she had been voting in elections. Her civil status was listed as single in the complaint and the OCT, and she was living with a Chinese citizen named Felix Lao, with whom she had four children, without being married to him. The land had been planted with coconut trees prior to the sale, and the defendants had introduced improvements. The lower court rendered a decision in favor of the plaintiff, ordering the defendants to reconvey the land and pay the reasonable value of its produce. The defendants appealed.

ISSUE

Whether the plaintiff, Natividad Cabacug, despite having lost her Filipino citizenship by marrying a Chinese national and not having formally reacquired it through repatriation, retains the statutory right to repurchase the land acquired through a free patent under Section 119 of Commonwealth Act No. 141 (the Public Land Act).

RULING

Yes. The Supreme Court affirmed the lower court’s decision. The plaintiff’s statutory right to repurchase under Section 119 of the Public Land Act is not defeated by the defendants’ plea regarding her citizenship status. The Court held that: (1) The right to repurchase granted to a holder of land acquired under a free patent is a clear legal right not to be set aside by the defendants’ extraneous plea, which could only be properly raised by the government as the aggrieved party. The ease with which repatriation could be effected further weakens the defendants’ argument. (2) The defendants’ conduct was not in good faith, as they were aware of the plaintiff’s status as a widow of a Chinese national at the time of purchase and appeared to harbor an intention to frustrate her statutory right. (3) The other errors assigned by the defendants were factual in nature and could not be reviewed in a direct appeal to the Supreme Court, which is limited to questions of law. The judgment ordering reconveyance and payment of the land’s produce was affirmed.